Republican Senator Bobby Hanig, representing North Carolina Senate District 3, has spent four years in the General Assembly standing in opposition to policies that would benefit his own constituents.
While Democrats and Republicans in the state legislature have been working to find a compromise to expand healthcare access to over half a million North Carolinians, Hanig has repeatedly stood in opposition to Medicaid expansion efforts and has said it’s “not the answer.”
Hanig holds these views on healthcare while serving the people of Eastern North Carolina, an area that has seen hospitals shut down and the availability of rural healthcare services become almost non-existent in some places.
According to a study by Chartis Center for Rural Health, 1 in 4 rural hospitals are at risk of closing and at least 7 have already closed their doors in North Carolina. Medicaid expansion would provide needed funding for these pivotal facilities to stay open and provide care for their communities. Medicaid expansion would be a massive development for hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians, including Hanig’s current, and potential, constituents.
In addition to his opposition to Medicaid expansion, Hanig has called for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act. This could mean rolling back protections for pre-existing conditions, allowing insurance companies to deny people coverage because they’re already sick.
Hanig isn’t just an extremist when it comes to policies impacting his district, he’s also a proponent of “The Big Lie” that claims President Joe Biden wasn’t fairly elected and that ex-President Donald Trump actually won the 2020 election. Hanig signed a letter with the stated goal of overturning the election and having the entire country conduct an “Arizona-style” election audit.
Hanig was also one of the NCGOP members who voted to censure Sen. Richard Burr after he voted to impeach Trump for inciting an insurrection and he called Trump’s first impeachment “an extremely sad day in American politics.”
Leaders in the General Assembly have indicated that they are hoping to reach an agreement on Medicaid expansion by next year following elections in the General Assembly this November. North Carolina voters will have the opportunity to decide the fate of healthcare access for generations and Senator Hanig has made it clear where he stands.
